Prime Minister misled or badly briefed

The Prime Minister has either been deliberately misleading about the Auckland land dispute or he was not properly advised by Housing Minister Nick Smith, Opposition Leader Andrew Little says.

“John Key said yesterday Ngati Whatua has no right of first refusal and there is no land parcel that can be used as the basis of a legal case to test this provision.

“But now it has been revealed that one of the four land parcels touted by Nick Smith – at Moire Road in Massey – was notified by the Government several months under a limited partnership which includes Ngati Whātua.

“It beggars belief that Nick Smith didn't know the site had been notified under Right of First Refusal provisions when he was showing it off to journalists and Australian property developers.

“The Government's Budget centrepiece housing policy has become a farce. The Prime Minister said yesterday the four sites Nick Smith showed off to journalists were just 'conceptual' and not actually for sale.

“This follows news last week that another of the four sites – beside the motorway at Manukau City – is not even owned by the Government.

“With Auckland house prices up $115,000 in the past year and the shortage of housing worsening by the day, Generation Rent deserves more than the half-baked last-minute fiascos that pass for housing policy under this Government,” Andrew Little says.

ENDS

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